Here’s my ode to the pro wrestling of my childhood (OK, it’s really a study on identity but who’s analyzing!).

I saw an advertisement about an event with wrestling stars from the 80s, and I wondered how can they could still do it. They are at least my age. Recently, I hurt myself in my sleep. I’ve never been hit in the head by a metal folding chair but it is on my bucket list.

Call pro wrestling circus of the bizarre, freak show, extreme performance art, or choreographed sports-entertainment, but don’t call it fake.

Stop your eye-rolling if you enjoy only so-called legitimate sports from legitimate sources. Let’s not forget what the first letter of ESPN represents.

Now on with today’s entertainment:

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The Butcher

“The Butcher”

Abdullah announced to jeers

Madman from the Sudan

Parts Unknown enough for me

…

Larry Robert Shreve

To his Canadian family

Nobody named Larry sticks forks

In foreheads for a career

…

Ask Abdullah’s opponent

At the world’s first book festival wrestling match

(and maybe the last)

If those 46 stitches were fake

…

Sued for infecting wrestlers with hepatitis C

From sharing favorite fork or razor blade or barbed wire

Or soup can lid found in a trash can

Abdullah the Butcher is that real

…

If you still don’t believe in a non-fake life

Visit southwest Atlanta or Japan

And dine

At Abdullah the Butcher’s House of Ribs and Chinese Food

…

Taste for yourself

If Chinese food in Japan is fake

It’s real food for real people

At reasonably real prices

…

We are all from Parts Unknown

Identity crafted performance perfected

And as fake as faces scarred by foreign objects

While the ref’s back is turned

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